


Twists and Turns

by DawnsEternalLight



Category: Batman (Comics), DCU (Comics)
Genre: Bonding, Brothers, Damian being a kid, Fluff, Gen, Jason being a good brother, but also being extra, rube goldberg machine, there are some feels and angsty stuff if you squint
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-11
Updated: 2018-01-11
Packaged: 2019-03-03 13:42:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,348
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13342437
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DawnsEternalLight/pseuds/DawnsEternalLight
Summary: Jason walks in on Damian building a Rube Goldberg Machine and decides to help.





	Twists and Turns

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ChimaeraKitten](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChimaeraKitten/gifts).



Jason slipped in the back door to the manor and almost walked into what looked like a Lego roller coaster set on stilts. At that point he stopped and evaluated how much sleep he'd had and what he’d eaten recently. He needed to make sure he wasn’t hallucinating. The last time Jason had seen Legos in the manor had been back when he was Robin. Dick had brought them over in a display of brotherly affection. They’d built with them until Bruce had come home and Dick had to leave.

Which begged the question of why Jason was seeing some kind of towering Lego structure in the back hallway. Jason wasn’t a kid anymore. Dick was out of town, and exempt from being blamed for trying to force Damian to play with the things. And Jason was sure Tim wouldn’t waste time on them, not when he had more important things to do.

He had to have had some bad chicken the night before. Or maybe he’d been hit with something delayed by Ivy a few nights back. There wasn’t another plausible reason he could come up with. Especially as he followed the roller coaster further into the building, and out into another hallway. The Legos shifted into a wooden structure set up to continue the tracks through the hall. Rope, wheels, gears, and even some kind of watery bit continued on as Jason wandered the halls, following his hallucination into the library.

“I have told you, this will work.”

A meow followed the words and Jason was sure he was hallucinating. He turned around a stack of books and found Damian crouched beside the contraption. He was balancing a set of dominoes on a bridge built from pencils.

He narrowed his eyes at the kid, “You’re not bad chicken.”

One of the dominoes tumbled off the bridge. Damian looked up at him and scowled. “And you are a fool. Do you have any more obvious observations to share? If not leave.”

Alfred brushed up against his leg and purred. Jason crouched beside Damian, eyes running across the structure. The not hallucination.

“What exactly are you doing?”

“A science project.” Damian sniffed, reaching down to pick up the fallen piece.

Jason turned his attention to his brother, his face was set in a hard line. Eyebrows turned down in determination, but there was a pout to his lips that hinted at hurt. So this was a spite project. He was going over and above to prove someone wrong. 

He raised an eyebrow at Damian, “Did Tim make a snide comment about you and your building skills?” he hazarded. 

Damian turned to Jason, piece still in his hand, “What are you talking about, Todd?” he frowned. 

Jason shrugged, and waved a hand at one of the loops in the structure (held together with pipe cleaners twine, and a chip clip), “This isn’t a normal science project. No one builds a Rube Goldberg through a building for fun. Now, who stood you up or hurt your pride?” 

His brother huffed, but looked away, “Kent was supposed to help. Father has told you I am attending school with him now, correct?” he waited for Jason’s nod, “I was-unclear on my teacher’s instructions about the machine or it’s purpose. Jon offered his assistance.” 

“So what, you’ve built a monster version to spite your friend for not showing up?”

“Not out of spite.” Damian glared, “To prove I can do it on my own.”

Jason wasn’t going to tell him that was the same thing. 

“And he did not forget, he and Superman were busy.” 

Ah. It didn’t matter if it was super business or not, Damian was less mad about his friend not helping and more about the situation around it. Jason hadn’t gotten a fix on if his brother was upset about Jon having some father son time with his dad or if it was the fact that Damian had been abandoned for something else. His money was on a little of both. Bruce had responsibilities pulling him in a hundred different directions, and Jason didn’t see him anywhere in the vicinity of Damian’s machine. Plus, it was never fun to have your friend bail for his dad.

He had fond memories of Bruce helping him with school projects. Sometimes Alfred would even step in. Once Dick had been around to help him work on a salt map for a geography class. They’d both ended up with their fingers stained an assortment of colors.

Jason rolled his sleeves up, “Alright, how can I help?”

Damian’s glare deepend, “I told you, Todd, I can do this on my own.” 

He eyed his brother, “Really? Because I’m pretty sure I could huff and puff and blow this thing over. You need someone who knows a thing or two about Rube Goldbergs.” 

“And you are that person?” Damian shot back.

Alfred was pressing against his knee, Jason reached out to pet the cat. His fur soft under his palm. “I’ll have you know I won first place for mine in school.” he said, fingers itching behind Alfred’s ear. 

It had been quite the contraption. He and Bruce had worked on the plans for a solid week before even starting it, then they’d been meticulous about the details. He’d managed water, air, and fire components to it, and ended with the marble painted green from it’s starting pink. 

Damian hummed and looked him over, “Father has told me you were an excellent student. You would even skip patrol in favor of homework.” the last sentence was said with a bit of incredulity.

“School’s not all that bad.” Jason said, “There’s a thrill to learning, and a bigger one to finding out you’ve got a problem right.” 

Damian’s attention turned away from him, and he began fumbling to put the domino in it’s place, fingers attempting to stand it next to the others. “It is pathetic.” he snapped, the domino tumbling off again, “The classrooms are filled with sniveling children whose worst fear is being sent to sit in a chair for an hour longer than their alloted school hours. They do not value education.” 

Jason thought about the few times Damian had mentioned his education at the league. He usually huffed about having this or that scholor as his personal tutor, but the tone of his words this time said something more about those tutors, and hours learning. It wasn’t hard for Jason to take his own knowledge of how he’d been taught there and apply it to Damian’s experience. He hadn’t known excitement at figuring out the next step in a problem, or pride at seeing good test scores. He’d been proud alright, proud when his mother came around and he’d done well, but he also knew relief that nothing worse would come if he got everything right.  

How do you tell a kid learning is fun when all it had been for him was a lifestyle? A thing deserving of reward or punishment? He had to be the best, Talia would have expected little else from him. And when he wasn’t, well Jason could see the result of that in Damian’s body language. In his bitterness that his classmates didn't appreciate their situation. It could be so much worse.

“You’re right.” Jason said, scooping the fallen domino up, “Most kids don’t care about school. They’d rather be home doing other things. But, that doesn’t mean no one cares, and it doesn’t mean you shouldn’t. There’s a lot to be gained, even if you know most of what your teachers are saying. They’re always willing to answer outside questions if a student shows they care, plus B’s got you at some fancy school right? I bet their library is amazing.” 

“Tt. It is a rather impressive library.” 

“See.” Jason grinned, “A plus already. Now let me help with this and we’ll film the whole thing to send to Jon and make him jealous he missed out.” 

Damian smiled at that, “That is a good idea.” 

“I’ll give you an even better one.” he said, holding up the domino, “We run this whole thing through Tim’s room and make it so he can’t even get in until it’s taken down.” 

His brother stood, and held a hand out to him, “I believe we have a deal.” 

Jason dug out his old plans for his and together he and Damian modified the large drawing he had on butcher paper. Then Damian showed him where he’d left most of his supplies, in a basket in the living room. It looked like stuff filched from all over the house. A handful of straws from the kitchen, toothpicks, tons of office supplies, some paintbrushes, wood from out back, there was even a roaring bear statue from the hallway. Jason looked up at Damian at that and the kid shrugged.

“The instructions said to make it as unique or strange as possible. I thought the marble could roll into its mouth.”

There was no arguing they were going to end the project in Tim's room with the bear. Jason scooped it up and hauled it to his brother's room. Tim was out with Steph and his room wasn’t locked. Not that it would have stopped either Jason or Damian from picking the lock to go in anyway. 

They had to move part of the machine so it could weave in and out of the library, then up the stairs to the bedroom hallways. The shifting meant pieces had to be removed and returned, but when they went to put it back together somehow both Jason and Damian ended up with pieces left over. They left them on the ground beside the shifted area and moved on.  Jason lost track of how much time they worked on it, and his reason for coming over in the first place. He thought he’d been looking for a book, but he hadn’t remembered what title it was even after they’d taken a stack to help with the foundation of the machine leading up the stairs. At some point he imagined he’d come over for Alfred’s cooking, but that could also be from his stomach grumbling. 

They took a short break to eat, wolfing down sandwiches under Alfred’s careful eye. He was not happy about their little project, and had made it very clear he would not be picking up any of the mess.

“Come on Alfie, when does Damian ever do something like this?” Jason had asked. 

“Only when you or Master Richard are around.” 

Jason had grinned. 

The best part was trying it out. With a machine so large and complicated it required constant testing to make sure the marble Damian was trying to get to the end never lost too much momentum. Sometimes Damian would stand at one end to drop the marble, and Jason would follow it along its track and others it would be Damian running after it, with Jason at the front.

Once he’d released a whole bag of marbles, running them down the machine one after another. Damian’s squawk of fury, accompanied by a bark from Titus let him know that most of the machine at least was working, and racing the marbles through at a ridiculous pace. 

They were almost finished when Bruce found them. It was Bruce Jason had come to see, he remembered. There was a case he wanted to go over with him. He worried the question for a second before pushing it to the back of his mind. Cases could be handled later, after they'd finished their project. 

Bruce picked his way carefully past the winding machine as he approached. His eyes moved from it to Jason and Damian and back in a circle, like he was trying to piece together how and why his home had been invaded by a game of real life Roller Coaster Tycoon. His eyes settled on Damian. 

“What’s all this?” 

“My school project. Todd was gracious enough to assist me with it.” 

Bruce hummed, and turned his attention on Jason, “I seem to remember it being much smaller the last time we made one of these.” 

It was. It had been fun. It was a good memory. Jason wondered if Bruce ever thought of that time, or of any of the times he’d helped him with a project or puzzle out a math problem. Probably. They’d got to the point where Jason could admit Bruce did think about him. That he thought well about Jason and even missed him. It didn’t hurt so much to imagine Bruce missing him, it didn’t spark anger either. Just a longing of his own, one he wasn’t sure what to do with. They were still in a messy, tangly place, but it was better. He hoped it’d continue to get better. 

“Damian’s friend stood him up. So, we showed him up.” 

Bruce raised an eyebrow, “Jon?” he asked Damian. 

The kid crossed his arms, “He had forgotten about prior plans.” 

So, it had been dad time and not super time. Jason was all the more happy he’d decided to help out. 

Bruce nodded, “And how were you two expecting to prove you’d ‘shown him up’?” 

Jason grinned, “We were going to film it. Damian has to as proof for school.” 

His brother nodded his agreement. “It is too big to bring with me, and the instructions say we can film our project as long as we provide documentation as we worked on it.”

“And you’re allowed help?” Bruce asked. 

“Tt, of course.”

He nodded, “Would you mind an extra set of hands?” 

Damian pressed his lips together and Jason nudged him, “He did help me win first prize on mine.” 

“Alright, but you cannot be mad at our destination.” He said. 

Bruce raised an eyebrow. 

“Tim’s room.” Jason provided. 

At that Bruce laughed, “I should have guessed.” 

Damian rolled his eyes, and grabbed both Jason’s and Bruce’s wrists, “Come on, we do not have all day to stand around talking.” he said, before leading them back towards the laid out plans.


End file.
